AMD 790GX Head to Head

Conclusion

As you would expect, being based on the same chipset, there is nothing to separate these two motherboards. The benchmarks were so close that there is no possibility you would be able to tell the difference between the two in real world use. Each motherboard has it's own unique colour scheme (used in the loosest sense) and each board is well designed with an almost identical layout.

So then, how can I choose between the two? Both the Gigabyte and the MSI could well benefit from BIOS revisions which may fix the little niggles I came across, albeit they were nothing major in the first place. I could judge on the overclocking results but a 100MHz difference is nothing astounding enough that I would choose the Gigabyte over the MSI. I certainly wouldn't choose one board over the other simply because I didn't like aliens on the packaging either. I could choose one over the other for a number of reasons if I were being pedantic but none would be significant to write home about and as such perhaps the only way to settle this is cost.

The Gigabyte board is priced around £15 less than the MSI which, for the budget conscious AMD user means everything. Why else would you choose AMD over Intel were it not for the price? AMD are sadly still way behind Intel in the CPU department but still manage to hold on to some of their customers because of the fantastic bang per buck and features AMD have to offer. Throw in on board VGA that's capable enough for low end gaming and you have a budget board that actually offers quite a lot more than Intel based motherboards at the same price point. Other than the price, neither motherboard stands head and shoulders above the other in any of the departments. Whichever motherboard you choose, be it the DKA790GX Platinum from MSI or the MA790GP-DS4H from Gigabyte, both boards will serve you and your AMD CPU well and I can see no reason, other than perhaps the price, to recommend one over the other.

MSI DKA790GX Platinum

The Good

- Overclocking dip switches

- Memory BIOS options

- Accessories

- On-board Power switches

- On-board VGA

The Mediocre

- Colour scheme

- 5 SATA ports

- Ram slots close to CPU cooler

The bad

- Nothing to report

Gigabyte MA790GP-DS4H

The Good

- Slightly better overclocking than the MSI

- Easy on the eye BIOS

- Packaging

- On-board VGA

The Mediocre

- Colour Scheme

- SATA location

- No Crossfire bridge

The Bad

- Nothing to report

Thanks to MSI and Gigabyte for providing the motherboards in todays review. Discuss in ourforums.

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